Desire Avenue

An OPEN Letter to members of this Forum...

Four days ago i put an image up in the Tori Amos thread,which i discovered was removed yesterday,and a PM from RobB as Moderator,explaining that he had removed said image because he had received a PM, from an unnamed person ,complaining about it,so he removed it -(Quote) "...to keep the peace and harmony,etc,etc,its easier to remove anything that someone else finds offensive "(unquote)...This is not exactly Democratic in my eyes,in fact its bordering on the Fascist,something I cannot condone,,,this is the Free State of Europe,Not China or North Korea...If the complanant had the guts to air their views on an OPEN FORUM and not in a clandestine backhanded manner,then the members of this OPEN FORUM,could have democratically debated this subject,and if the concensus was to remove the image,then I would have accepted it as a democratic decision.
The irony is that i copied this Image (I hasten to add that it had nothing to do with Tori Amos),from another Forum,which right now has 56 users online (a figure this site could only dream of)and the image has been up for 9 weeks now and not one complaint.
Therefore it is with a sad regret that i leave this (supposedly)OPEN and FREETHINKING FORUM ,that I have supported in its many incarnations,for 10 years.
Today should be a happy day for me as its my Eldest sons 16th Birthday,but it has been tinged with sadness by this sorry state of affairs
So in those time honoured words,Goodbye...and thanks for the fish...
John.

barrett wrote:This is not exactly Democratic in my eyes,in fact its bordering on the Fascist,something I cannot condone,,,this is the Free State of Europe,Not China or North Korea...

First of all John, I'm really sorry that you've been upset and offended by my taking action at removing your link on the 'Tori' thread. I do hope you will reconsider and continue posting here as your posts are very much valued.

This isn't 'official' (i'll leave that to Alex and Paul to comment on if they so wish) but my personal view is that these boards do not represent 'the Free State of Europe' or any other area of this planet. This forum is open to every one or all ages. There are no borders here. At the same time,keeping that in mind, iti is important to at least try and not have material posted that is likely to cause offence. Thats not always possible of course and an off-hand jokey comment which is funny to 99 people might be offensive to 1 person. So retrospectively, if a complaint is made, the offending post will be automatically removed. Its not discussed or debated because what would be the point? Everyone is different and will like or dislike different topics/posts anyway but if something is being construed as being offensive (whether I think it is or not is immaterial) then it goes for the reason I outlined in my private message to you.

barrett wrote:If the complanant had the guts to air their views on an OPEN FORUM and not in a clandestine backhanded manner,then the members of this OPEN FORUM,could have democratically debated this subject,and if the concensus was to remove the image,then I would have accepted it as a democratic decision.

The complanant did make a posting on the forum, immediately after your post, but I removed that message once action was taken.

As mentioned previously,as far as I'm personally concerned 'censorship' is not open to debate. It has nothing to do with democracy,its everything to do with applying common sense and trying not to offend anyone, especially when the problem is easily solved.

In a perfect world, everyone could write and post what they like and no one would be offended or upset. This is not a perfect world, not even a perfect forum but we try our best.

For all vistors to these boards, if you are genuinely offended by anything you read here, please let the mods know as we will take action. We do want this to be an enjoyable place for Stina fans to hang out.

barrett wrote:An OPEN Letter to members of this Forum...

Four days ago i put an image up in the Tori Amos thread,which i discovered was removed yesterday,and a PM from RobB as Moderator,explaining that he had removed said image because he had received a PM, from an unnamed person ,complaining about it,so he removed it -(Quote) "...to keep the peace and harmony,etc,etc,its easier to remove anything that someone else finds offensive "(unquote)...This is not exactly Democratic in my eyes,in fact its bordering on the Fascist,something I cannot condone,,,this is the Free State of Europe,Not China or North Korea

We are exceptionally lucky on this board that there is little to no moderation of posts. This is not the case on many internet forums - I think you'll find that many have rather stringent rules in place about the posting of offensive content, particularly with regard to racist and sexist material. The comment you posted fell squarely into the sexist category, and on many boards would have been automatically moderated without anyone needing to complain.

'Bordering on the fascist'? Hardly. A moderator has dealt with an offensive post. That's his job. You clearly have a problem with a judgement being imposed, but you seem to have no problem at all imposing your offensive comment on others. I could just as easily characterise that as 'fascism'.

barrett wrote:...If the complanant had the guts to air their views on an OPEN FORUM and not in a clandestine backhanded manner,then the members of this OPEN FORUM,could have democratically debated this subject,and if the concensus was to remove the image,then I would have accepted it as a democratic decision.

The complainant DID air her views on the open forum, in no uncertain terms, as she has done on numerous previous occasions when members of this board have bandied mysoginistic terms of abuse around. I stated exactly what I thought of your vile comment, and informed you on the open board that this time, rather than wasting my time and energy debating democratically as I have in the past, I would be making a formal complaint to the mods. My complaint was made on the open board, not via PM.

barrett wrote:The irony is that i copied this Image (I hasten to add that it had nothing to do with Tori Amos),from another Forum,which right now has 56 users online (a figure this site could only dream of)and the image has been up for 9 weeks now and not one complaint.

Along with the many moderated forums on the internet, there are many unmoderated ones, where people can be as racist, sexist and otherwise nasty as they like. We are all perfectly free to decide which kind of forum we prefer to participate in. Democracy and all that.

barrett wrote:Therefore it is with a sad regret that i leave this (supposedly)OPEN and FREETHINKING FORUM ,that I have supported in its many incarnations,for 10 years.

I'm sorry you feel that way, but I completely empathise. Had your comment been allowed to stand, I would no longer have participated in this community, much as I cherish it.

and more
get a life, seriously. If you cannot stand to be moderated just disconnect you from internet.
It's just a picture ! What a terrible fuss for such a little thing... Overreacting only makes you unhappy at the end.

As a clever person, you may know more what fascism is; so please respect people that are really opressed and tortured because of their opinions. You're not one of them.

And this is not a open forum, I should remember you the terms & conditions you agreed when you subscribed to this board.

Nobody is forced to join and use this message board, if you don't like people, moderation... please stay away from it. That's all.

alx5962 wrote: and more
get a life, seriously. If you cannot stand to be moderated just disconnect you from internet.
It's just a picture ! What a terrible fuss for such a little thing... Overreacting only makes you unhappy at the end.

Alex,you've just proved that you have noidea as to what was deleted.It was not a picture,just words,Thats like saying"I've heard that zzzzz film is disgusting and although I have not seen it,Ithink it Should be banned".

And if you truly read my post,i stated it was BORDERING on fascism,ie censorship,being told how to think and act.

barrett wrote: Alex,you've just proved that you have noidea as to what was deleted.It was not a picture,just words,Thats like saying"I've heard that zzzzz film is disgusting and although I have not seen it,Ithink it Should be banned".

And if you truly read my post,i stated it was BORDERING on fascism,ie censorship,being told how to think and act.

Maybe you're having a bad day or being in a bad mood so you overreacted about this.
Please remember a board is moderated and if you cannot live with this you'll be very disappointed on the internet.

Fascism is a very hard word even more for me.
This board is moderated 1 to 3 times a year and there no place like this anywhere online.

So it will be the last message about this subject as I close this topic.
Feel free to stay on this board if you wish, I have no plans about banning you for now.
But in this case, remember we are good guys & gals here just wanting to have a nice quality time.